New year, new films to try out and old films to get to know better!
In this post I will briefly walk you through what’s in my filmfridge, what I plan on shooting and when/why, as well as some general thoughts about analog film photography.

As of today, this is what’s in my film fridge:

First of all, here’s a lot of brands and film stock you might recognize, but also some newcomers. I’ll move my way down the list starting with some of the more unknown films, and those being black and white films.

Film Washi

Washi is a small independent film producer from France, from which I have two films; “S” and “Z“. The “S” is and ISO 50 film which was originally made for sound recording at motion pictures, and “Z” is an near infrared film with a speed of 400. I plan on shooting both S and Z for primaraly landscapes – S because of the promised low grain, and Z because it’ll be nice to experiment with a near infrared film (with and without a red filter) when we get more foliage here in Sweden.

Foqus

Type D is a 200 ISO b/w film from Sankt Petersburg which promises fine grain and a low tolerance for miscalculating exposure. No specific plan for this, but I’m thinking daytime shooting.

Japan Camera Hunter

I’ve been keeping up with what Bellamy Hunt (the person behind JCH) is up to on and off since he joined Kai Wong a couple of years ago camera shopping. So when I saw that he released a branded film, I thought why not. JCH400 looks like a great street photo film, I’ll try the first rolls as 400 and then maybe try another couple pushed. Will be interesting to test it out!

Foma

From the Czech Republic comes one of the more familiar B/W film brands – Foma. Here I have one roll of Retropan 320. I’ve already shot one roll of this during the photoshoot for Master K’s new release “Dorian” (out 13th of February via my label Gance Media!) which I found very suitable for the theme of her single. It’s a smooth grayscale, good coverage in the shadows, but with a “soft” (as promised) clarity and not much contrast. Perfect for that vintage look, especially portraits, but not so much for my usual routine.

AGFA

Good old AGFA, that is no more AGFA. The story of this company is something for another day, but regardless I have two rolls each of their APX 100 and APX 400. These I have with just the intention of trying them out, since I haven’t shot APX before, and I see it as a “daily walk” kind of film.

CineStill

CineStill make still photography film from motion picture film. I’ve previously tried their colour films – the 800T and 50D (tungsten and daylight balanced respectively) with mixed results, but I’ve yet to try their B/W offering of which I have one roll;BWXX. No specific plan for this film either yet.

Now were onto the big league, Ilford and Kodak!

Over the years I’ve probably shot about more Kodak than Ilford (thanks Tri-X for that), but lately I’ve begun drifting more towards Ilford over Kodak.

Ilford

Pan F is a film I discovered while watching one of Erik Wahlstrom’s videos, and run through a in the last parts of 2018. I love the grain (or lack there of?) and the smooth tonality! Also the idea of being able to shoot wide open on sunny days without and ND-filter, or stepping down for some cool long exposures is always a tempting idea in my world.

Delta 3200 – Pushing film have for the longest time meant “TRIX @ 3200”, but having films designed for pushing is noticeably better. Although not being a true 3200 speed film, it holds up very well both at 3200 and 6400, although preferably being a bit more overexposed than what your meter reading tells you. As so often.
This film is especially well suited for the Swedish winter, but I see street photo and daily snapshots in the horizon.

SFX 200 another near infrared film! This one is something I’ve heard of since a while back, but haven’t really gotten around to trying out. Much as with the Washi film, I’ll probably wait for spring to come around before I try it out.

Kodak

I almost always keep a couple of rolls of TriX 400 in my inventory, but after I just finished a bulk of 10 last autumn, there’s a temporarily some missing. But what difference does that make when I have some freshly re-released P3200?!

P3200 have been re-introduced to the market after Kodak decided to discontinue this film stock a couple of years ago. So far I’ve only shot one roll which I’m still to finish, but from what I’ve seen, this should result in a good pushable film which has a little bit more contrast than Ilfords Delta 3200.

Moving on to colour, here we’re mainly talking about two brands – FujiFilm and Kodak. I’ve always been more of a Fuji-shooter than a Kodak, but seeing as Fuji is constantly discontinuing films (#FujiNOTFilm), I’ve gradually moved more and more to shooting Kodak. I’m still not over the discontinuation of the Superia 800 (fantastic film, or the decision to scrap Superia 200 – a SUPERB consumer film with great tonality – in favour of the slightly inferior C200.. But what can you do?

FujiFilm

I still keep a roll of Superia X-Tra 800, waiting for a good opportunity to shoot it. This past Christmas I loaded my other roll of 800, and is yet to finish it. The same goes for the 3-pack of Superia 200, I’ll probably wait for summer before I load some of those, seeing as I have a strong connection between summer and Superia 200.

In more vintage news, and discontinued, I have one roll of Reala 100 (which was frozen until recently) and one roll of Superia 100. I know that the Reala still holds up today, but I’m not so sure about the Superia 100. I’ll wait with both until there’s plenty of light to work with!

In the list of not-yet-discontinued-films from Fuji, I have one of the few “classics” left; X-Tra 400 – a film I’ve shot almost as many over the years as the 200. Not quite as good, but a good alround film which I often have loaded for casual outings. Finally there’s a roll of Pro 400H, the competitor to Kodak Portra 400. I’ve shot some 400H before, most noticeably the photo shoot and cover photo for Master K’s “Diamond Destruction”. It’s slightly “cooler” than Portra. This film will probably sit on the shelf until either a photo session occurs, or I get bored, haha.

AGFA

I’m interupting the feud of Kodak x Fuji with two rolls of (also discontinued) Vista Plus 200. I got these for a shoot out I’ll be doing later this year, compering different films of 200 and 400 speed, so look forward to that!

Kodak

Everybody know Portra, and everybody has an opinion. I for one love the look of Portra 160 and Portra 400, but I couldn’t see myself having this as my only stock. It is a very good all-round film, especially the 400 speed version and excelent for portraits – but also quite nice for some types of landscapes.

The rolls of Gold 200 and Ultramax 400 is kept for the same reason as the AGFA ones, but these will also be used as a “daily driver”-kinda film. I’m especially fond of Gold 200, mainly due to nostalgia, haha.

Lastly from Kodak, a couple of rolls of Ektar 100 – just a lovely film which I shot much of my landscapes on when I want less grain, but most importantly, a bit more punch of saturation.

CineStill

Got a spare roll of 800T, a film I’ve shot before with varying results as mentioned before. I’m not super fond of the 800T, as I’m by much preferring the 50D, but I’m sure I’ll find a purpose for this roll also.

Lastly, Instant film. Mostly when I’m shooting instant, it’s FujiFilm Instax Mini – but sometimes it’s nice to change things up with a pack or two of Polaroids. Here’s a couple of packs of Polaroid 600-films for my Impulse AF camera, two colour and one b/w. I’ve already shot through one pack of colour in January to try it in low/minus Celsius conditions.

I’m a firm believer in that if you truly want to get good with shooting film, it’s advisable to chose one specific film, and then just shoot that as much as you can until you know it’s pros and cons, quirks and handling inside and out. At the same time I’m also firm believer that you need to try out different stocks to get a hang of which ones you like, as well as beeing a good way to spark some new life to your imagination. Film is not constant, although not declining as much as a couple of years ago, so there’s no better time than now to try and try to your hearts content with what’s left in this market – they might not be left tomorrow.

Although I’m sure film will never die, we might not have many choices in the future.